U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar (DFL) may not have realized how appropriate her comments were Monday at the renaming ceremony of the downtown Minneapolis post office for long-time 5th District Congressman Martin Olav Sabo.
“He delivered for this district, he delivered for the country,” she told a gathering of about 100 friends, family members, and longtime colleagues of the seven-term congressman.
They gathered at the far east end of the post office’s main floor, a massive 540-long corridor topped by one of the longest light fixtures in the world.
A plaque was unveiled, showing that an act of congress to rename the post office was approved on Dec. 27, 2022.
All members of Minnesota’s congressional delegation had to approve the measure, which current 5th District Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (DFL) noted was accomplished.
“May this post office, where my dad worked for nearly 20 years, continue to serve the public in the spirit of the Congressman,” Omar said.
Mike Erlandson, Sabo’s long-time chief of staff, joked that the only one who would have voted against the designation was Sabo himself.
Sabo, who was once speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives during a 17-year stint in St. Paul, first took the oath of office in Washington in 1979.
He stepped down in early 2007 after deciding not to run for an 15th term. Sabo died in 2016.